Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will inaugurate location tracking devices on passenger carrying commercial vehicles at a function of the state Transport department at Alipore tomorrow. This is for the first time when installation of the device will be made mandatory in such vehicles.

A senior officer of state Transport department said a notification had been issued asking the owners of commercial passenger vehicles to install the device latest by 31 March. Action will be taken against the owners of those vehicles who don’t install the device and these vehicles will not be given fitness certificate. Punitive measures will be taken against the owners and they will be fined Rs 50 per day for the delay. All passenger carrying busses, mini buses, yellow taxis, app cab, school pool cars will be brought under the purview of the new system.

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In case of trouble, any passenger can press the panic button which will be connected with the police control room. In case of any accident, the system will inform the control room within 8 seconds. The control room in turn will inform the local police station. Miss Banerjee will also inaugurate a multi layer parking lot at Alipore tomorrow. A senior officer of the state Transport department said arrangements had been made to park 1000 vehicles initially. The capacity will be increased in phases.

He said this will minimise traffic jams due to parking of vehicles on Baker Road in front of Alipore Judge Court. The cars are parked on the left flank upto Alipore post office. This causes narrowing of the road which has made daily traffic jams. All these vehicles will be parked in the new parking plaza. The multi layer parking lot has been constructed by the state Public Works department.

Earlier, there was an office on Indian Railway Construction Corporation (IRCON) land and vehicles used to be parked on the open land. Miss Banerjee who uses the road to reach Nabanna from her residence of Harish Chatterjee Street urged the PWD engineers to come up with a plan so that proper parking arrangement can be done. Accordingly, the PWD engineers came up with the plan and constructed it.